He meets my eyes for a second and in them I see this person I don’t recognise. Where did my husband of twenty-two years go? Where is the man I loved? It hits me in that moment, a crushing reality that the man I chose to spend my life with is not who I thought he was. My heart feels like it’s bleeding. Memories rush through my mind like a sharp gust of wind. I think of our early days when we went for a weekend to the quaint old town of Cortona in Tuscany and danced on the cobbled streets by the moonlight until the sun came up. I recall our first anniversary when he set up a treasure hunt through Venice, hiding notes in historic sites that culminated in a gondola trip through the magical canals, with him dressed as a baritone and serenading me with an off-key rendition of ‘O Sole Mio, Santa Lucia’. But then the memories are gone and in their place is this moment – the coldness of the jail, my husband sitting across from me, the horrible truth in the space between us. I snap myself back to the present.
‘I loved you, Marco,’ I admit. ‘You failed me. You failed our children.’ I stare at him now and fight the tears building at the back of my eyes. He can’t see any weakness. He can’t know how deeply he has hurt me. ‘How could you do this to us, to Emily? Was the necklace more valuable than your own family?’
He fidgets with the sling around his broken hand. ‘At the time, I truly believed that what I was doing was the only way. I knew with the right trigger, you could access those memories. You are a brilliant woman, Sarah.’
I’m now fully aware of what he is doing – trying to use flattery to colour what he has done in a more forgiving shade. ‘And you thought an abduction of our child was the trigger. And you didn’t care that you were using your own daughter as the bullet,’ I snap.
‘I made sure that she had everything she would need. Clean clothes, a television, a bathroom, food. I instructed Don to tell her that she wouldn’t be harmed.’ He lets go of his sling. ‘She was just a formality.’
My anger comes back with such force that it straightens my spine and makes my cheeks feel like they are made of fire. ‘You pig!’ I spit out. ‘You sit there pretending that you are remorseful but it’s just an act. In your warped mind, you actually think that there was nothing wrong with what you did. You’re sicker than I thought.’ I want to reach across the table and slap him. ‘You know Emily woke up in the hospital screaming your name? She dreamed she was running away from the abductor and she was calling for you to come and save her.’ He tries to look away from me but I maintain a steely gaze so that no matter what direction he turns he won’t be able to escape the heat of condemnation in my eyes. ‘To think she thought of you, her father, as her hero, when in reality you were the villain. She’ll never forgive you. Neither will Daniel. For as long as your children live, they’ll hate you.’
He has an irritatingly arrogant expression on his face as though he hasn’t absorbed a word of what I’ve just said.
‘They’ll understand one day why I had to do what I did. And they’ll forgive me,’ he says simply.
It’s his blatant refusal to show true remorse that makes me even more sure of what I’m about to do. I tap my heel on the concrete floor.
‘If only the necklace never went missing, then none of this would have happened, right?’ I say in a gentle tone, pretending I might finally be seeing things from his warped perspective.
His tight jaw softens. ‘Exactly.’
I uncross my arms and lean forward conspiratorially. I maintain eye contact because I want to see the exact moment his face contorts with the shock of what I’m about to reveal. ‘Only I do know what happened to the necklace.’
He sits upright. ‘You know who stole it?’
‘I did,’ I say simply, and watch with guilty pleasure as he writhes in his seat, his whole body going stiff.
‘What are you talking about, Sarah?’
‘You know that night we found it. Actually, what am I saying? Not we, the night I found it.’
He listens closely. ‘Well, after we locked it in the safe, I was going to drive home. You had to fill up with petrol, remember?’ He nods impatiently. ‘But you didn’t make a petrol stop, did you?’ He shifts anxiously on the seat as he waits to see what I am getting to. ‘You went to see Sofia. I drove straight past you that night, locking lips on the street without a care of who might see you.’ I hold his gaze. ‘Well, someone did see you. I did.’
The penny drops. He freezes, then his face goes red and almost blue as if he is about to explode. ‘You hid it, didn’t you?!’
I lean so close to him now that he can feel my breath on his cheek. I speak softly, almost in a whisper. ‘You see, you are smart, Marco. You’ve solved the crime of the disappearing necklace.’ I smile smugly.
‘You bitch,’ he snarls. ‘You set me up.’ His bloodshot eye goes even redder.
‘You know how we took all those photos of the necklace and there was no trace of them on my phone?’ I continue, knowing that I have his full attention. ‘I literally just had to press delete and they were gone. Just like that. One button and there was no evidence we had ever found it. Amazing, isn’t it?’ I smile broadly.
His breathing becomes laboured and a vein throbs on his forehead. ‘You faked the car accident? You never lost your memory?’
‘Faked all of it,’ I lie, and relax back in the chair as if I haven’t got a care in the world. He doesn’t need to know the whole truth; it’s better that he thinks I planned the whole thing.
‘But where is the necklace?’
‘Somewhere safe,’ I say simply. ‘I would have hated if it had fallen into the wrong hands. But I don’t need to worry about that anymore.’
He stands up now and starts yelling at me. ‘Troia!’ he screams in Italian.
I stay seated, enjoying his outburst. It plays beautifully into my plan. ‘Marco, language. There are people around.’
The guards walk over. ‘Everything okay here?’ they ask, looking at me.
‘Fine,’ I say in a deliberately nervous voice. ‘For now.’
‘Sit down,’ they instruct Marco, and he does what he’s told. They return to their post.
‘You know, Marco, I’d hate for people to think that you’ve lost your mind with the way you’re carrying on. I mean, it’s almost as if you’re a madman,’ I say with faked sincerity. I suddenly feel an invigorating pulse run through me as I prepare to reveal my act of revenge in all its exquisite detail. ‘I mean, there actually is no evidence that you ever found the necklace. None whatsoever. There were no photos on my phone and it was so badly damaged in the accident that I have since had it replaced. It’s at the bottom of a river now, just in case you were hoping forensics could still find a trace of the pictures.’
I watch him closely, waiting for him to grasp the full scale of the downfall that I’ve so carefully crafted for him.
‘I was in a car accident the night we supposedly “found the necklace” and have no memory of ever finding it. In fact, the police are now in possession of a receipt from the ballet theatre that I “found” in a pair of pants, meaning that I must have seen a show the evening we supposedly “found the necklace”. They’ll gather CCTV and see a clear picture of me milling around the foyer after the show, even gazing absentmindedly at the surveillance camera, thus providing irrefutable evidence of my whereabouts that night. Meaning, I never went to the lab at all.’ I watch as his face twists with irrepressible anger. ‘You see, Marco, I thought of everything.’
‘You bitch,’ he swears again, this time in English. ‘You won’t get away with this.’
‘Won’t I?’ I make puppy-dog eyes. ‘Of course I will. The only evidence of the discovery was photos on my phone, which don’t exist. After my accident and subsequent memory loss, you hire a man to abduct your own daughter in an attempt to trigger my memory so you can reclaim your prized necklace and receive the fame you so desperately crave. Honestly, Marco, you do sound crazy.’
I sit back now and smile calmly as I watch the realisation dawn on him. He stands and pushes his chair
away from the table. It screeches on the cement floor and everyone in the visiting hall turns to look as he starts yelling. ‘She set me up! She never lost her memory! She faked the whole thing!’
‘Marco, calm down,’ I say, standing up and wincing back as if I’m afraid of him.
The guards rush over and restrain him but he keeps screaming as they lead him away. ‘She set me up. I swear.’ He fights to break free.
Just before they take him out of the visiting hall, I look at the guards. ‘I do hope he gets the help he needs.’
I never lied. That’s Marco’s domain. I only told him I faked my memory loss and car accident because it makes my plan for his downfall so much more rewarding.
I did lose my memory. It was as if a black hole had opened up and engulfed two entire days of my life. And the things I forgot in that stretch of time came to have more bearing on my life than any other event in my entire existence.
Up until then, I always thought my memory was infallible. I didn’t know then what I know now – that memory can be the difference between love and hate, between survival and death, between forgiveness and revenge.
You can’t imagine how frustrating it is to know that the memories are there but you can’t access them. I knew from the start that Marco was right. Something happened in the two hours between midnight and 2 am that would be the key to explaining the necklace’s disappearance.
When Emily was abducted, I was more desperate than ever to regain those memories; I felt like her life was in my hands. But it wasn’t until Sofia called – to tell me about the message she had stumbled upon and, in doing so, inadvertently revealing her affair with my husband – that a memory was triggered. It was fragmented at first, broken parts without a whole, until eventually all of it returned with shocking clarity.
I remembered the heartbreaking moment of seeing my husband’s lips on another woman’s, his eyes locked on hers, hungry, yearning, like they had once been for me. I had sat in my car and cried. I felt crushed. To know that he was having an affair was the ultimate betrayal, with the added insult that he chose to celebrate the victory with her on a night that should have been ours.
I remembered sitting in my car for a while, thinking of what to do. At first, I just felt shattered. Lost. Like my life was over. I had put his career before my own to be his loyal and dutiful wife, and yet despite all the sacrifices I had made for him, he betrayed my trust. But then I realised how pathetic I was being. I wasn’t some lowly woman without an occupation, solely dependent on a man to fulfil her emotionally and financially. Stuff him. Screw the bastard.
And that’s when an idea formed in my mind. I could make him pay. I could break down that shiny ego of his, shatter it so irreversibly he would never be able to put the pieces back together. I would get the ultimate revenge. It was satisfyingly brilliant. He had played me and I would play him.
So, I wiped my tears, turned on the ignition and prepared for my greatest act. I had a season pass to the theatre so I knew Swan Lake was showing. I waited outside the theatre until the show ended, walked inside concealed within a large group as they walked out, made sure I was captured in the foyer on CCTV. I went to the bar and bought a packet of nuts and a drink, and kept the receipt – concrete proof stamped with a time and place of where I’d been that night.
Then I went back to the castle, opened the safe and took the necklace. On my way out, I glanced upon the art restoration schedule I’d seen earlier that night and it sparked an idea … I knew exactly where I could conceal the necklace. A place no one would think to look. At least, not for a while …
My plan was to hide it there and then watch my husband be humiliated when the media arrived the following morning for his ‘announcement’.
I wanted him to have his desperately desired fame, but in a way that would be recorded for him to relive over and over again. I was going to stand by him as the cameras rolled for his announcement and then seemed stunned when he opened an empty safe. He would turn to me and claim the necklace had been there, that we’d both seen it in the real pietre dure box with our own eyes and I would have stood there, shocked and concerned for his psychological wellbeing, denying ever finding anything. Then I would watch his face transform in front of the cameras when he realised that I had betrayed him. To see that arrogant smile contort into humiliation.
So that night, after I hid the necklace, I headed home. It was close to 2 am by then and the town was asleep. Marco was probably still with his mistress, unaware that I hadn’t come home yet. And if he were home, I’d make up an excuse for being gone so long like he had to me so many times.
Then by the Mugnone River I remembered the photos we took, the only evidence of finding the necklace. So, as I drove, I deleted them and then gazed down a final time to make sure they were all gone. When I looked back up, it was too late. I crashed through the barrier, was knocked unconscious from the impact, and left with amnesia.
Marco had so desperately wanted me to regain my memories so he could get back what he lost. But with their return, he ended up losing far more than he would have ever thought possible.
The ordeal gave me a new perspective on memory. Memories are the fabric of our existence that we wear like a second skin, sometimes with a lightness, other times as a heavy burden, but with us always, a patchwork quilt how we came to be. We are what we remember. If my memories hadn’t returned, would I still love Marco as fiercely as I had? Would I have swallowed some lie explaining away why he did what he did and somehow forgiven him?
If that time were still forgotten, I wouldn’t be walking out of a jail now with a smile on my lips knowing that my husband got what he deserved.
SIX MONTHS LATER
MARCO
‘I never thought I’d be in a room like this talking to someone like you. I suppose you want me to start at the beginning. To show how we got here. How everything fell apart.
‘It starts and ends with the necklace. A rare masterpiece. A time capsule of history told in diamonds and stones. Flawless in its perfection.
‘Maybe I was never meant to be its keeper. Because, you see, I’m its antithesis. I’m flawed. I’m a rough diamond. If you look closely, you’ll see my imperfections, how loosely I’ve been strung together. All it took was one link to unclasp to set off the chain, to everything unravelling. Piece by piece.’
He looks at me patiently and doesn’t interrupt. I get the feeling that he’s different from all the others and is actually listening. I’ve told this story so many times now that it almost feels like I’m reciting a monologue.
‘So, this necklace,’ he says when I eventually pause. ‘When did you first become interested in its whereabouts?’
‘I began studying it about ten years ago when I first learned of the pietre dure box found off the Isles of Scilly.’
He raises an eyebrow and makes a note. ‘A decade. That’s an awfully long time,’ he says, obviously impressed by the longevity of my work.
‘I went on to write my PhD thesis and a host of papers on my theory that the real box and jewel were never lost at sea. Although, that’s no longer a theory since I found the necklace and proved it to be true. So, it’s fact now,’ I say, correcting myself.
He seems to be listening intently. ‘So, did it become, let’s say, an obsession?’
The word obsession gets under my skin but I do my best to maintain my composure. ‘A passion is a better word.’ Perhaps if I explain some of its unique features he’ll understand why it is so exceptional. ‘It is one of the most valuable jewels in the world. A remarkable chain of faith, of superstition, of cultish devotion, of Italian history, told through the stories of its thirteen gold meshes, seven hundred diamonds, two hundred and seventy-six rubies and ninety-two emeralds.’
‘I can see, Professor, why you would be so enamoured with such a valuable artefact.’
I’m relieved to hear him address me correctly. I like him better than all the others. He seems like an intellectual, whereas the ones before him were
all carbon copies of each other and treated me like a second-rate citizen.
‘And your ex-wife, how did you meet?’
I tell him the story of how we met at Cambridge, how we initially butted heads and seemed wholly incompatible, how we eventually formed an unexpected but passionate romance. It’s hard to speak about Sarah now with any sort of warmth. I can’t believe I loved that woman. When I even say her name now, I shudder. She’s become a cancer that I can’t rid myself of. But I won’t say all that yet. I need to win him over first, so that when I get to that part of the story, he’ll see through her lies, instead of believing them like all the others have.
‘Tell me how you felt the night you found the necklace.’
His hands are clasped and he keeps a steady gaze on me. None of the others have asked me that. For the first time in six months, I think someone might actually believe me. A smile spreads across my face and I feel like I’m reliving it again. The glimmer of the stones, the sparkle of the diamonds, the touch of their perfect edges under my fingers, the smell of history so perfectly preserved. ‘It’s hard to describe. It was like I was filled with light. I had this buzz of energy. A sense of deep fulfilment. I’d never felt anything like it before. Or since.’ I lean forward and grin because he seems to be smiling with his eyes, like he’s right there with me, in the moment. ‘Can you imagine what it’s like, to devote your entire career to the search for this piece of the past and then to finally hold it in your hands?’ I mime feeling the texture and I see him watch me. I know he gets it. ‘It was incredible. Like a rush drug addicts would get from their first hit. You just can’t recreate that feeling.’
He looks down at some notes. ‘What happened when you returned to the safe the following morning?’
My leg starts to twitch. I put my hand on my knee to keep it in check. ‘It was gone,’ I say. ‘It had vanished. I was sure it had been stolen. I panicked. I didn’t know what to do. Sarah was the only other person who had seen it and when she woke up, her memory was gone.’
The Perfect Couple Page 30